WIDENING THE SUEZ CANAL.

Oamaru Mail, Volume XXXVII, Issue 10238, 30 August 1909, Page 2

WIDENING THE SUEZ CANAL.

(By Arthur Hamilton.)

When Ferdinand de Lesseps carved his way through the narrow neck of sand joining the African to the Asian Continent, so that the waters of/the Mediterranean commingled with those of the Red Sea and afforded a new and shorter route to the East, he little realised that within half a century such huge strides would be made in shipbuilding as to threaten the utility of lus great ditch. True, as yet there are no Lusitanias or Deutschlands flying between, Europe and the Orient, but every year the dimensions and tonnage of craft linking the two sides of the world together are increasing in size to meet the augmented demands of traffic. The results are that the engineers responsible for the maintenance / of this narrow waterway are hard put to it to accommodate the shipping favoring this route. . -.„„„ When the canal was opened m 1809 the width of the waterway at surface was from 150 to 300 feet, tapering to 72 feet in width at the bottom, with an average depth of 26 feet. But less than a quarter of a century's operations sufficed to show that such dimensions were quite inadequate to meet advancing shipping requirements. The responsible authorities recognised that a determined constructional contest woiildhavc to be waged against the shipbuilder to maintain an open channel suitable for all craft that might follow this highway. The Suez Canal Company, however, adopted a bold, enterprising policy. Exigencies of traffic demanded that it should be widened, and widened it should be; and not in any haphazard manner either, but upon a well devised scale, throughout its entire length of 100 miles. A special engineering commission was appointed and the problem thoroughly thrashed out in all its phases. It was no mean task that was essayed, for the efforts required to keep the waterwav open are truly herculean. Passing through the ill-famed Arabian desert swept by terrible sand-storms, the drifting soil falls into the waterway, and were it not for the constant and unceasing vigilance displayed by the engineers it would rapidly silt up. Huge dredges toil day and night removing the sand 'deposited therein by the simoons—a grim battle with Nature. The commission, as a result of their labors, advocated the increase of the width of the canal to double its original distance from bank to bank at water and bottom levels, and at the same time to deepen the channel considerably. In order that no interference should be offered to traffic during the consummation of the undertaking, special arrangements were to be prepared for the accomplishment of the task in sections and upon such a scale that the enlargement could be completed within about nine years from the commencement of operations. It was truly a bold task, since it meant practically the construction of a new canal. The directors, however, agreed with the recommendations of their commission, and in 1901 decided to carry them into effect. The sum of £1,000,000 was voted for the commencement of the work, and within a few weeks all preliminary arrangcmontshad been fulfilled for making the sand fly. To carry out the enlargement of the canal according to the plans of the commission entailed the acquisition of an

extensive plant of the most up-to-date description. These included elaborate dredging and excavating machinery, comprising a powerful bucket dredger, -with attendant lighter and five carrying barges of 520 cubic yards capacity, together with two water-tank lighters, pipc-lincrs through which the excavated sand is raised and pumped on to the shore for building up the low-lying banks, 60-ton floating shovu'-lcgs, a 12-ton floating crane, special appliances for breaking up the rock where it existed so that it might conveniently be brought to the surface, miles of rails, trains of narrowgauge tracks for the haulage of excavated material, herds of camels, and a 3000-ton floating dock for obviating the necessity of despatching the floating appliances to Suez for dry-docking when the occasions arose. So rapidly did the work proceed that in 1904 a minimum depth of 28ft was provided throughout the whole distance between Port Said and Suez, so that vessels of a maximum draft of 26ft might safely pass through from sea to sea. The canal width was increased by

50ft and twelve new points where vessels might pass were established; while plans for the construction of another twenty-one similar crossings were prepared, together with plans for the deepening of the canal to 3-Uft. By January, 1908, this latter part of the undertaking was achieved, and to-day vessels of 28ft draught can safely pass through from the Bed to the Mediterranean Sea. The method adopted for widening the canal is to cut terraces in the banks, one above the other, along which narrow light railways are laid. In this way the material is removed to the water-level and the desired slope of the bank obtained. Then huge dredgers force their noses into the bank and eat their way to the desired line, either dumping the excavated sand into barges lying alongside or forcing it through long lengths of floating pipe-line on to the banks, thus building up a stable embankment upon which vegetation .s ultimately planted so as to keep the friable soil in place. The ballast for the. most part comprises sand, though here and there stretches of rock are en-

countered. In such cases the peculiar Lobnitz sub-aqueous dredgers are brought into action. Long piles tipped with special steel-cutting Heads' are raised perpendicularly into the air and then allowed to drop plump upon the mass of rock, which under such continuous pounding splits into small fragments which can be easily removed by dredgers. This type of dredger is one of the most useful to the engineers, since it enables them to grapple with situations which otherwise might prove somewhat difficult, in a cheap and economical manner. Recently the company increased their fleet of these by the acquisition of a third vessel, which is the largest and most powerful of th's type in the world. Several other schemes subsidiary to the canal proper, bjt the completion of which will appreciably contribute to its financial sukss, are also in progress. At Port Said a huge dock has been laid down, so that vessels may unload their cargoes on the wharf instead of discharging into lighters as was formerly the case. Slnuld this development prove successful, two other docks of a similar character are to be completed. Moreover, at this point, owing to the construction of the Port Said-Cairo railway on the Egyptian bank, huge docks are being laid down on the African shore, for which purpose the Egyptian Government has ceded nc less than 358 acres of land. To fulfil Ibis task alone will necessitate the total excavation of over 4,000,000 cubic yards of material. It is intended that ultimately crossings shall be provided at intervals of every three miles, and the provision of these facilities for j ermitting vessels topass one another will exercise material improvement in the traffic-handling capacities of the canal. These crossings are nearly 3000 ft in length, and at such stations the canal has a bottom width of some 150 ft. Curves are also being straightened,. as the presence of such in a canal, as upon railways, is prejudicial to rapid transit. Moreover, in connection with the main widening scheme a large tract of land has been reclaimed from Lake Menzaleh. Here large quantities of ballast have been dumped, while a wide and deep channel across the lake lias been dredged to admit of ferry-boat communication between Port Said and Matarieh, the eastern point of the fertile country of Mahsourah. At a future date t,his ferry-boat channel will be' connected with the main canal by means' of a lock; the existing freshwater channel running parallel with the waterway being siphored under the

■former. • , The benefits accruing from the widening of the canal are-already being manifested in no uncertain manner. On the one hand, it has resulted in the period of the passage being cut down from ( forty-eight hours to apprpximately seventeen hours. More vessels can pass„ through the narrow path of water than formerly, the. total number in 1908 being 3795 vessels, representing an aggregate, of over 19,000,000 tons. Also the increased width has assisted in no slight degree to the avoidance of traffic derangement arising from an accident. Twenty-five years igo the stranding or

foundering of vessels in the navigable channel, which completely held up both north- and south-bound traffic, averaged 4.3 per cent.; to-day it is only about 1 per cent. Occasionally, however, the resources of the authorities pre taxed to the supreme degree by an abnormal accide rt such as occurred in 10.,5, when the Chatham, laden with explosive'-!, came to grief in collision and sank in the centie cf the chaunel. For several days traffic was completely tied up, and a huge congestion of vessels resulted at both termini. When the wreck was finally removed, the authorities passed through no fewer than 109 craft of all descriptions—fiftysix from the south and fifty-three from the north —within four days, which >s a remarkably smart achievement.

As is weil known, the Su'ez Canal offers 'me ji tin 1 most satisfactory invvestments in the world, a point which is not without significance seeing the enormous number of shares held by this country. When first opened the dues levied were Ss per ton all iound. In 1870 the average tonnage of vessels frequenting th.i lughn ay was about 1500 tons; to-day it is over 5000 tons. While the passenger dues on passenger boats still remain the same, those on other craft have been reduced L'y per cent, tip to the end of 190G no less than £24.499,3'>3 had horn expended in constructional work, while the revenue had risen from £1,240,968 in 1876 to £4,479.565 in 1906, received from the passage of 3975 vessels aggregating 13.445,594 tons througu the canal. These figures convey some idea of the enormous volume of traffic flowing through this narrow artery and the widespread effect it has exercised upon the commerce between East and West. The reserve funds of the company stand in the neighborhood of £1,000,000, while the special fund out of which the expenditure on new plant is defrayed represents the same figure. Between the years 1870 and 1907 over £7,000,000 were expended on improvement works, and during this period over 150,000,000 cubic yards of material have been dredged from the waterway.